The Polar Express Story Sequencing Giveaway

 All Aboard! The Polar Express is my absolute favorite read aloud for the holiday season. Every child I know loves it too! I'm so excited to share this new item with you!

 I've created this story sequencing activity to go along with the book. It can be used in a pocket chart, as a cut and paste sequencing project or at a literacy center for retelling.

You can enter to win a copy for your own classroom. Head on over to Teachers Notebook to enter the giveaway! 

While you are there, check out all of the amazing sales through December 2nd!

 Everything is my shop is on sale too!

I have a mile long wish list and plan to shop and save this weekend!

 Let the fun begin! :)

Teachers Pay Teachers Cyber Sale!

Yippee! It's almost here! The two days you have all been waiting for! No, it's not Thanksgiving or Black Friday I am talking about, but the huge Cyber Sale at Teachers Pay Teachers! 

So, you may want to spend some time this holiday weekend browsing for things to add to your classroom shopping wishlist!

All of the items in my Kidsrcute shop will be on sale too!

 Remember to enter the promo code CYBER at checkout! 

Head on over and link up your sale with Learning With Mrs. Leeby!  Thanks Mrs. Leeby! :)

Happy Shopping! :)

My Second Grade Classroom Blog

I just finished a (better hurry up and post it before it's Christmas) monthly update of my classroom blog with a few photos and highlights from the month of November. I'm not sure if I have ever shared my classroom blog with you! Feel free to stop by and take a peek inside my room! The blog has some good information on the page tabs and some adorable photos of my little turkeys in action! I prefer not to put too many kid pictures here at Creative Lesson Cafe even though I have signed media releases for all of them.

Honestly, I have been trying to drive some more parent traffic to my blog. You'll see I have like 10 followers! I limit myself to monthly posts because I see so few page views there. I encourage visits to the blog in my newsletters. There is a link from my school webpage too. People are busy. I get that. 

So, I had this brainstorm to set up my laptop at conferences next week with the blog pulled up on the screen! I know some of our struggling families do not even have a home computer. For those that do, I'll have them subscribe by email right there on the spot! I am also going to periodically assign some homework for students to write to comment on a favorite activity or photo from the classroom blog.  

If you see something I have done with my students that you have shared, I apologize in advance for not giving credit. I do not Pin from that blog or advertise products in any way so as not to mix my daytime profession with my second job as a seller. It is strictly for parents, because it is linked to the school website. If you see something and want to know where it came from, I will be more than happy to write you back in the comments at this blog for all to see! :)

There are no product or freebie links, but you might still get some great classroom ideas, have a good laugh and find some good information there too! 

Do you have a classroom blog or website? I have set up a kid blog in the past and would love to do that later in the year! The students blogged about the adventures of our traveling teddy. 

And this marks the official start of Thanksgiving break for me! Yay! Tomorrow, it's appointment and Christmas shopping day, Thursday and Friday are eating days and then the weekend will be spent decorating the outside of the house and putting up the tree!Can't wait!

Have a fun and restful holiday! 

My Truth Monday~ The Perfect Vacation!

Take me away! It's just too cold too early and that means a very LONG winter. Don't know what I would do without a vacation to look forward to. I am a fun in the sun kind of girl which is why it is easy to choose my truth for a vacation spot!Now that I think of it, it's time to get going on purchasing plane tickets! This location has become a wildly popular hot spot recently for good reason!

What is your perfect vacation? Link up with Denise at Sunny Days and tell us all about it!

Reading Response Notebook and New Freebies

I want to be sure my students are really reading and not secretly dreaming about what they are going to have for lunch even though they look like they're reading!

Just out of the oven~ a new creation to hold kids accountable for independent reading during Daily 5 Read to Self or to use during Reading Workshop! Yes! 

I took the best of the Cafe Menu and sprinkled it with a little metacognition and added some sweet reading strategy tips (and of course, a dash of cute) and there you have it, a reading response notebook that can be used with just about any book~ both fiction and nonfiction.

You can choose a mentor text too and assign a fitting prompt. Students cut out the prompt header and glue it into the notebook and then respond in writing. The best part is that the prompts can be used again and again as sort of a spiral review.

If you want to read more about this product, just click on the cover page image at the top to see it at my TPT store. 

As with any new item, it is offered at a discount for a limited time!

Here's my example! (Note the zebra print, my fav)

 By the way, I've discovered recently that coloring can be very therapeutic and relaxing! I've been doing a lot of coloring for new item samples lately! Thank goodness for twistable colored pencils, the best invention yet in my opinion! They are on my school supply list and I highly recommend them, especially for coloring detailed pictures neatly. Goodness, we have enough pencils to sharpen! 

There is also a plain cover if you teach older students that are not into cute or coloring!

 Here are a few more views:

These are just a few samples of the prompts from the pack:

If you have been thinking about starting response journal notebooks with your class, this is an easy way to get going! The pages fit in both a composition book or a spiral, so you can use whatever you have purchased or collected for your class. 

I was thinking that these prompt headers would also make for great task cards at a writing center when printed on colored cardstock if notebooks are not your thing! This is an example of a measurement task card set I copied on colored paper laminated to last.

 So, if you want to read more about the reading response notebook, just click on the cover page image at the top to see it at my TPT store. 

As with any new item, it is offered at a discount for a limited time!

On another note, I have updated some items and added some new freebies, including fonts to download and math work mats at my store. While you're there, you may want to browse around to see what you might like or need! Check all of the categories on the left of my store homepage, not just freebies, as they may be found throughout the store.

You can grab this colorful work mat for math fact modeling practice. The image will take you there! Hope you find some other things you can use!

Feeling Like a Turkey~ Thanksgiving Bulletin Board Idea and Freebie

• In high school, I walked around all day with a curler in my hair and no one said a word. 
• Something totally embarrassing fell out of my purse in plain view of people who should not have seen it!
• As a new driver, I hit a police officer on his way to work. 
• I forgot where I parked at the mall and had to have security drive me around to find my car.
• Someone had to do the Heimlich maneuver on me when I choked at a fancy wedding.

I'd have to say that last one tops the cake!

 Yes, there are so many times I definitely felt like a turkey!

This was the writing prompt given to students for this cute project idea shared by my teamies! We enlarged a turkey graphic, added a title, copied it on tan paper and added some writing pages behind it to create a flip book. 

The kids loved posing for a picture in a goofy turkey hat. We glued the photos to the front. 

If you don't own a turkey hat, you could make one like this for a photo prop:

source

Here's what one student had to say inside her booklet:

I feel like a turkey when I go sharpen my pencil and plop, I drop it in the trash!

(I hate when that happens because then I have to reach my arm in the can and fish it out!)

I do that too! :)

Oh my!

My personal favorite, and one that I hear often throughout the day,

I feel like a turkey when I call my teacher~mom!

You can download these freebie pieces from my Dropbox! 

When have you felt like a turkey? Hee Hee! 

This could be fun! Don't be shy!

Life Long Ago Anchor Chart Freebie

Boy, there are some fabulous looking anchor charts floating around Pinterest aren't there! Let's face it though, it takes time to be creative and to make them. I've decided to try to save some time in the years ahead and start to create some pieces for my anchor charts that I can reuse each year!

I print a photo or clipart in color, type a heading with a cute font, laminate the pieces, cut them out and tape them on the chart paper or butcher paper. All that needs to be done is the writing with the class or adding sticky notes! I recently did this for our Columbus Day bubble map. Now Christopher is all set to go for next year's chart! 

I made this set of printable Smart Chart Parts for our life long ago unit. 

There are several printable graphics in frames and some titles too.

It's a freebie at my store. I hope you can use it! :) Click on the image to download your copy. 

If you have a tip for working smarter, not harder, feel free to share it below! 

A Pink Pencil Sharpener! Enter to Win!

This is the pink Cadillac of all pencil sharpeners! :)

 I am trying AGAIN (no, I am not especially lucky) to win a snazzy new, quiet, pretty in pink sharpener in a giveaway that Heather at Second Grade Perks is having.

I am on my second wall mounted sharpener already this year. The handle has fallen off both of them but they are standard issue school supplies so what else might I expect? The two rather costly electric sharpeners I recently purchased bit the dust as well. I am so hoping to win!

What color would you pick? Head on over to see Heather and learn more about these amazing sharpeners. You've got three days left to enter to win one yourself! Thanks for crossing your fingers for me! I'll do the same for you!

Time Savers, Hints and Creative Learning Activities

I don't have eight arms, but I sure can juggle a lot on a daily basis!  How do I work in all the "icing on the cake" activities and those little fun extras and all of our creative lessons into a very demanding schedule in a rigorous curriculum while still maintaining my sanity? Whew! I'm tired just thinking about it! I know you get where I'm coming from!

Here's my helpful hint, which in turn is a time-saver and allows me to be able to seek out creative activities that provide meaningful learning opportunities: 

I have learned to be the master of delegation. I try to enlist the help of volunteers as much as possible. If the task at hand does not require an educated professional to do it, I pass it along to a number of others so happy and willing to assist! I choose to spend my time (and training) seeking out and creating new ways to engage my students in the learning process! 

I routinely schedule parents who love to help both at home and in school. I have a copy mom, project parents, computer lab volunteers, craft parents, room parents and MY OWN PARENT (love ya mom!) who help with prep work. I have a high school cadet in the afternoons and mentor student teachers because it truly is a job for two people! When I mentor, this is lesson number one! Work efficiently! 

I get my editable parent volunteer calendars from The Busy Teachers Cafe

 (Love the name!)

Do I really need to cut laminated items like this out? Nope. I think of it, I make it, I plan it, I send it off!

Items like this get sent with a student in "the homework bag". This is for parent volunteers who signed up at open house to help from home because they work but still want to help out. I just jot a note about the task, let them know when I need it back and include any supplies they may not have handy. 

This cute bag is available at Zazzle! 

As far as activities, we all work smarter, not harder! If there is no educational value in a task, I am OK with letting others help the students. If my goal is not fine motor development, then students cutting project patterns out takes away time they could be spending on some other type of learning. With my firsties and my second graders at the start of the year, they will do lots of cutting because they need to LEARN to cut smoothly and stay on the lines!

 For our interactive math journals, for example, the tabs have been cut and paperclipped together by parents. My high school cadet is working with the students to show them how to glue the tabs. I do have the students do this part themselves because it helps them take ownership and they need to see how the journals will be organized. We even talked fractions as we divided the notebook in halves and then fourths to split the pages evenly.

It's time-savers like this that help us make the most of the instructional time!

We are about half way done getting these assembled and I'm so excited to start using them! There are so many great activities out there like this one. I am thankful I have the time to find them thanks to my many helping hands!

If I didn't find ways to delegate and ask for help, I'm not sure that I would be able to accomplish it all. I want the best for my students and that means I need to have time to research and seek out great resources, plan and implement meaningful lessons and use best practices for instruction.

Creative hands-on activities are so powerful! They are my favorites and are so worth the time and effort!

 

 

So, my friends, ask for a hand!

 It is time well-spent to invest a little time to find ways to maximize your teaching time and student learning time.

 Hope you followed that! :)

So that was my three-days-rolled-into-one time-saving blog post! Please link up at Blog Hoppin and share yours too!

The First Thanksgiving Teaching Resources

 Instead of just reading about it, you can step aboard the Mayflower and take your class on a virtual field trip to Plimoth Plantation! At Scholastic, students can watch video reenactments of Pilgrim life and what it may have been like to live aboard the Mayflower! Scholastic also has some fantastic online resources and printables for Thanksgiving on their site!  You might want to head over to Scholastic and check it out! Click on the image to take you to the site! 

I learned some new and interesting things on my virtual trip! I also had a good belly laugh over the part about the "poop deck"! I think your class will too!

Apple Life Cycle Lunch Bag Book

Hello Friends!  With the forecast calling for the first snow tomorrow, it's time to say goodbye to some favorite fall things but not without something for my favorite unit~ apples! 

I know you too have probably long said goodbye to all things apple, but perhaps you can file this idea away for next year! While I had life cycles on the brain with the pumpkin lunch bag and was on a roll, I made this for apples!

If you'd like to read more about what's included, click on the image to see it at my shop. Since it's a little out of season, its on sale for a limited time! 

I hope you were able to enter the Fall Favorites Giveaway last week! I'm late with this here apple post, but I just went to the cider mill for one last time a week ago!

I'll leave you with some of my personal apple favorites!

Cooking up crock pot apple sauce in the classroom!

doodle apples from Doodle Art Ally

Rice Crispie cuties with tootsie rolls and laffy taffy.

 mom's homemade applesauce

And the best ever fresh, warm cinnamon donuts and hot cider from our local orchard!

 

Goodbye apples~ until next year!

Thanksgiving Project Time! Let the Fun Begin!

Feasts, projects, Pilgrims...I can't wait! I could seriously spend two months on the Thanksgiving theme, but have to pick just my favorites from my overstuffed November binder and project tub!

This little guy is one of my favorites because it's an easy to prep and colorful classroom decoration for the month. Last year, I hung our turkeys from the ceiling clips, but he would make for a great bulletin board display too!

All of the patterns you need for this project and some fun writing pages are included in this craftivity. If you want to see more of it at my store, click on the image below!

To welcome in November, my Thankful Turkey is on sale until Sunday!

Two sweet friends recently shared some Thanksgiving items with me and I'm so excited to use them with my little "turkeys". I'm sure they will be some of my new favorites. Stay tuned for Pumpkin Pie projects and Turkey Glyphs! 

What are your favorites for the month of November?